Last November, six students died in a tragic school bus accident in Chattanooga, TN. Now, a federal class action lawsuit is being brought against the Hamilton County School District and Durham School Services on behalf of an injured student. The lawsuit accuses the school district of violating students’ constitutional rights by...

On December 31, the collective bargaining agreement (CBA) between the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team and U.S. Soccer expired. The women’s team has been fighting for pay equal to that of the Men’s National Soccer Team. Hope Solo, the embattled Olympic champion and former goalie for the U.S. women’s team, shared her...

A federal judge has ruled that a portion of Wisconsin’s right-to-work law is unconstitutional. U.S. District Judge William M. Conley issued an order permanently forbidding enforcement of Section 9 of the law, which gave Wisconsin workers a free pass to back out of unions. The legal wrangling over Section 9 dates back to early 2016:...

The Toronto Star has published a shocking exposé on health conditions at a General Electric (GE) plant in Peterborough, Ontario. The plant now is up to code, but years of exposure to highly toxic chemicals have done irreversible damage to the health of many former plant employees: A silent tragedy has ravaged a tight-knit community...

New York Building and Construction Trades Council President Gary LaBarbera has been pushing the New York City Council to pass legislation that would require apprenticeship training for construction workers on projects more than 10 stories high. After the falling death of 59-year-old Wilfredo Enrique earlier this month – the latest in a...

The Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development just landed one of the largest recoveries of overtime wages in state history. The department’s Wage and Hour Administration secured $835,000 in overtime and liquidated damages for 159 employees of Gallo’s Mexican Restaurants and Taco King, Inc,: A recent investigation by...

Back in November, Maine voters passed a referendum that would increase base wages for tipped workers to $5 per hour. Now, Republican Governor Paul LePage has ordered the state Department of Labor not to enforce the new law. Yes, actually: Maine’s new minimum wage law, which would bump the base pay for bartenders and [&hellip...

ff Don’t try to tell us 2016 was the worst of it when Wisconsin workers are staring down the barrel of a loaded legislative gun. State Rep. Rob Hutton has introduced a bill that would block local governments from requiring Project Labor Agreements (PLAs) on public construction projects. Instead, Hutton said he would like [&hellip...

According to a new report from the Department of Labor (DOL), construction workplace fatalities reached a seven-year peak in 2015. The report, released last week by the DOL’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), says private construction industry fatalities increased by 4%, from 899 to 937, between 2014 and 2015. They also note the...

Missouri AFL-CIO President Mike Louis is proposing a 2018 ballot initiative that would prevent the state from becoming the next “Right-to-work” state. With the legislature and governorship now under Republican control, the anti-union law looks inevitable. Rather than wait around and watch it happen, Louis submitted a longshot...

San Jose wants to give more tax breaks to developers, but trade unions aren’t having it – not without a little something in return, at least. The city is offering half-off discounts on park fees and construction taxes to companies that build residential high-rises before 2020. The city council must decide whether it wants to...

One of the primary goals of North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU), the group representing hundreds of thousands of skilled workers from more than a dozen trades, is to boost apprenticeship and training nationwide. They invest handsomely in these efforts in myriad ways. One of their more recent, forward-thinking approaches has...